


eyes on the stars

by thespacenico



Series: klancemas 2018 [11]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: M/M, Stargazing, adam and shiro are actually helpful this time, broganes, keith is... soft, supportive big bro figures, they tease but they mean well
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-18
Updated: 2018-12-18
Packaged: 2019-09-22 08:22:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17056259
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thespacenico/pseuds/thespacenico
Summary: klancemas day eleven: stars





	eyes on the stars

**Author's Note:**

> i started writing this at 1am which might help explain why it's suddenly super soft hours

Keith wakes up and he knows.

He wakes up and he just knows that if he doesn’t say something soon then this feeling—(this fluttering in his stomach, the stuttering of his heart, the catching of his breath and the flush of his cheeks)—this feeling is going to build and grow and swell until it’s so much that he bursts.

Because Keith wakes up but Lance is still asleep, and Lance—(Lance, with the pretty blue eyes and the sun-kissed skin and the wind-swept hair and the crooked smile and the freckles that Keith would trace into constellations if he could)—Lance is everything that Keith is not.

And maybe that’s why it scares him so much. Because he looks and he sees a boy with sunshine in his smile and stars in his eyes and he wants to get close, close enough to touch but he’s afraid of getting burned, afraid of falling too hard too fast, of loving too intensely—

Maybe that’s why it scares him so much—so much that he finds himself in Shiro’s and Adam’s room, after stumbling out of the library and down the hallway—and he didn’t even have to say anything when Shiro opened the door, because Shiro is Shiro and he knows things about Keith that even Keith doesn’t know.

For a moment, Keith just sits. Shiro lets him sit on their bed with a pillow clutched to his chest and watch while Shiro moves about the room, going in and out of the bathroom and humming absentmindedly while he puts things away, and Keith wonders idly if that’s something that Adam loves about him. Loves the quiet in-between moments, loves the little parts of him that you only see when you’re really looking. And maybe that’s why Keith feels like— _that_ —when the corners of Lance’s eyes crinkle when he smiles, and he swings his legs when they don’t reach the ground, and his mouth moves when he’s reading to himself, and his brow creases in that very specific way it does when he’s concentrating.

Keith squishes the pillow closer to his chest and folds his legs tighter and stares at the floor. “Where’s Adam?” he asks eventually, while Shiro is folding some clothes (he’s terrible at it, but for whatever reason, Adam finds it endearing, so Shiro does it anyway).

“He got up early to make everyone breakfast.” Shiro shoves a poorly folded sweater into the bottom drawer of the wooden dresser against the wall and tries to close it—pokes at the fabric that scrunches up and keeps it from closing fully—pushes it closed at last. He walks over to the bed and sits down beside Keith, leaning back on his hands. There’s a moment of quiet. Keith squishes his pillow. Shiro sits forward. “Everything okay?”

Everything is okay, but everything—Keith is—

“Are you freaking out?” Shiro says softly.

And Keith squishes the pillow tighter and says—nothing, because he knows that Shiro knows that for Keith, nothing is more of an answer than anything. He chews a little on his lip, and then: “When did you know you liked Adam?”

Shiro doesn’t respond right away. Keith focuses very determinedly on a dark spot on the floor, until Shiro shifts a little beside him and he sighs. “I don’t know that there was ever really a specific moment.”

“I thought you said it was love at first sight.”

Shiro huffs a laugh and nudges Keith’s shoulder, and Keith smiles at the floor, just a little bit. “I think it was more like—a process.”

Keith wiggles his toes. He thinks about the day he had his grand realization, about the way that frequent warm feeling in his chest gave way to something more constant, more incessant, growing and spreading and demanding of his attention before it starts to boil and spill over.

“It took me a while to figure it out too,” Shiro continues, maybe a little teasing but mostly understanding. “It was kind of like—” He pauses, considering. Keith waits. “It was all these little things,” Shiro begins again. “Just one after another. And then once they started adding up I realized that I liked all those little things about him because they were the things that made him—Adam. Does that make sense?”

A rumpled jacket, a bright laugh, a mischievous glint in his eye—blue armor, lips turned down in concentration, eyes trained on a target—soft smiles and softer laughs, eyes crinkling—brow pulled, red streaking down copper skin, icy glares—laughter like bubbles, ruffled hair, hidden scars—

 _Yes,_ Keith thinks. “Maybe,” he says.

Shiro is quiet for a moment, and maybe he’s decided to push his luck today, because then he asks, very gently: “What do you like about him?”

 _Everything,_ Keith wants to say. _I like everything about him._

(Lance, and his pretty blue eyes and sun-kissed skin and wind-swept hair and crooked smile and freckles that Keith would trace into constellations if he could.)

Keith opens his mouth, then closes it. “I guess—” He makes a noise between a groan and a sigh. Squishes his pillow.

Shiro senses his hesitation and puts a hand on his knee. “Sorry, I’m being nosy. You don’t have to answer.”

“I guess—” Keith tries again. “I guess I like that he—cares. Like—” He pauses to chew on his lip, and Shiro waits patiently for him to continue. “It seems like everything he does is for someone else. Like he only tells all his—dumb jokes because they make people laugh, and he plans movie nights because he wants everyone to have fun, and he makes it his business to know enough about everyone to pick out dumb Christmas sweaters for everyone.” Keith’s chest feels tight, like there’s some kind of weight there but he doesn’t know what from. “And he just—he always finds something good in everything. He can take the most boring thing ever and make it fun just because he’s—him. So—” He pulls his knees up to his chest and wiggles his toes and plops his chin on the pillow. “Yeah,” he finishes awkwardly, voice muffled.

And because Shiro is—Shiro, he pats Keith’s shoulder and smiles. “When are you planning on telling _him_ that?”

 _Never,_ he thinks. _Soon,_ his brain amends. “I don’t know,” he mumbles.

Then Adam comes into the room to tell them that it’s time for breakfast, and Keith slips out of the room before he sees Adam glance questioningly at Shiro, who mouths a quick _tell you later._ Keith feels a little bad for so easily cutting off the conversation when Shiro was trying to be helpful for once, instead of teasing, but that feeling goes away when Shiro catches his eye at the table later and gives him a small smile, and Keith knows it’s okay.

Adam pulls him aside later that afternoon, when everyone’s drifted off throughout the cabin to nap or play pool or steal a snack from the kitchen. “Hey, I want to show you something.”

So Keith follows him out of the living room, up the stairs to the third floor, down a hallway, and just when he’s about to say there’s nothing here that he and Lance haven’t found already during their frequent exploration, Adam stops, reaches up, and pulls open a hatch in the ceiling.

Keith just sort of stares as Adam pulls down the adjoining ladder and looks at him expectantly. “You’re not gonna kill me up there, are you?”

Adam just scoffs and starts climbing, waving for him to follow. Keith follows behind, squinting a little in the dark when he clambers out onto the floor. He’s about to ask where they are when Adam wraps his fingers around a handle on the wall and starts to pull. There’s some creaking and groaning as wood scrapes against wood, until Keith is having to squint against the sudden afternoon sunlight filtering into the room.

He looks around as his eyes adjust, taking in the circular shape of the small room that they’re in, the half-open glass dome above them, and the telescope standing alone in the middle of the room. Some of the cool air seems to be seeping into the room from somewhere, but it’s not all that unpleasant with the sun shining through. Keith glances at Adam, his brow furrowing. “Is this like—an observatory?”

“You can’t see it from outside,” Adam nods, by way of confirmation.

He watches as Keith fiddles a little with the telescope, walks around to peek outside the dome and look at the snow covering everything down below. Keith turns to squint at him. “Why are you showing me this?”

Adam clasps his hands behind his back and pretends to study the telescope. “I thought you’d like it.” Keith raises an eyebrow when Adam looks back up, and he shifts a little. “It’s supposed to be a really clear night tonight.”

Keith sighs. “Shiro talked to you, didn’t he?”

“Of course he did,” Adam laughs a little. There’s a moment of silence as Keith turns away again, looking out at the softening sky as the sun begins to move toward the edge of the horizon. He doesn’t move, even when Adam comes to his side and looks with him, hands in his pockets. “Sorry,” he murmurs. “I’m just—trying to be helpful, I guess.”

(Pretty blue eyes and sun-kissed skin and wind-swept hair and crooked smile and freckles that Keith would trace into constellations if he could.)

“I—like him a lot,” Keith says quietly.

Adam looks at him for a moment, and then looks down at his feet. “I know,” he answers. “I know how that feels.”

Keith smiles, just a tiny bit. “You could propose up here.”

And Adam huffs a laugh, and ruffles his hair which he only does because he learned it from Shiro. “We’ll see.”

 _I’ll tell him,_ Keith thinks at dinner, when Lance leans over him to give his bread roll to Allura because she vaguely mentioned her liking for them a few days ago. _I’ll tell him,_ he thinks again later, when Adam makes hot chocolate again and Lance distractedly hands the can of whipped cream to Keith during his search for the marshmallows he hid in the freezer because he wanted to try to use them like ice cubes. _Tonight, I’ll tell him._

 

 **Keith K > lancey lance  
**December 11th, 11:59 AM

 **Keith K:** are you still up?

 **lancey lance:** have u learned nothing about me  
have u ever known me to go to bed at a reasonable hour

 **Keith K:** well i was going to ask if you wanted to sneak to the observatory with me but  
maybe i won’t

 **lancey lance:** wait what observatory?  
keith??  
keeeith okay i’m sorry  
ask me if i want to sneak to the observatory with u

 **Keith K:** do you want to sneak to the observatory with me

 **lancey lance:** yes pls :)

 

Keith has to shush Lance the entire way there because he can’t stop giggling. “I feel like I’m at the Garrison again,” he whispers, his eyes bright even in the dark. “I used to sneak out all the time after curfew.”

“We’re not even technically sneaking out,” Keith protests as they’re climbing the staircase to the third floor. “We don’t have curfew. Plus—”

“I know, I know, Adam can’t tell you what to do,” Lance snorts, and then he starts giggling again and Keith shushes him even though he’s smiling all the same. “But if we’re not technically sneaking out then why did you call it sneaking out?”

“It sounds more fun that way,” Keith shrugs, stopping a little abruptly halfway down the hallway and narrowly avoiding being plowed into by Lance. “Up here.”

Lance gasps excitedly as Keith reaches and pulls the hidden hatch open, sliding down the ladder. _“Whoa!_ How did we not find this? Wait, how did _you_ find this—”

“Are you coming or not?” Keith latches onto the ladder and starts climbing, leaving Lance with no choice but to follow. He climbs out and turns, peering down the hatch and holding his hand out when Lance reaches the top.

“Such a gentleman,” Lance mumbles, and grins as he takes Keith’s hand, and Keith is glad it’s too dark right now to really see each other’s faces properly or there’s no way that Lance wouldn’t have noticed the blush creeping up his neck as he pulls him to his feet.

There’s a split second in between where they’re both standing there, Lance holding tightly onto Keith’s hand, and Keith wonders for that split second what would happen if he just—didn’t let go. Wonders if maybe Lance wouldn’t let go if he didn’t let go.

He lets go.

“It’s so dark in here,” Lance whispers as Keith carefully steps around the telescope in the middle of the room and reaches for the handle that will open up the room to the sky. “Are you sure you didn’t bring me up here just to kill me? Maybe you’re the serial killer.”

“Do you really have that little trust in me?” Keith whispers back, and then he slides open the heavy wooden cover and watches as starlight floods the room and washes over Lance’s face.

(A boy with sunshine in his smile and stars in his eyes—)

And Keith is falling.

He stares as Lance lets out a little gasp of wonder, stepping closer to the exposed part of the glass dome as his eyes start to roam the sky. “Dude,” he breathes. “Not like I’ve never seen the stars before, but this is—there’s so many. You couldn’t even see this many from the Garrison.” He presses his fingertips to the glass, his mouth turned up into a smile. “They’re beautiful.”

Keith hasn’t even looked at the stars yet. “Yeah,” he murmurs. “Beautiful.”

They mess around with the telescope for a while, adjusting all of the lenses experimentally and pressing close together as they do, taking turns peering through the eyepiece and pointing out any of the stars or constellations that they recognize. The room is cold but Keith feels warm, feels it blooming in his chest and spreading all over the longer the night wears on, even after they’ve become bored with the telescope and moved on to bundling up in the blankets and pillows that Keith brought up earlier in preparation for tonight.

“It’s kinda weird, isn’t it?” Lance asks at some point, his fingers laced behind his head as he stares up at the sky.

Keith rolls over and props his head on his elbow. “What?”

“The stars never seem to get old,” Lance clarifies. “You know? Like, we’ve been up there ourselves. We’ve seen more stars than probably anyone else in the universe, so you’d think we’d get tired of them or something, but—”

“Now you like them even more,” Keith finishes.

Lance turns his head and smiles at him, and even after a million smiles it would still make Keith’s heart flutter. “Yeah, exactly.”

 _That’s what you are to me,_ Keith thinks. _You’re the stars. I would never get tired of you. I like you more and more, the longer I look at you, the more I see you._

 _I’m going to tell him,_ he thinks.

He clears his throat. “Hey, can I—” Lance glances over at him again, and his breath almost catches but he manages not to panic. “I need to tell you something.”

“Okay,” Lance agrees, rolling onto his side to match Keith. “What is it?”

And Keith looks at him, and the way his hair is swept across his forehead and the way his eyes seem to glow softly in the starlight and the way his smile turns up just so and Keith’s stomach flips and his heart jumps into his throat because Lance is everything that Keith is not and Keith—can’t.

“I, um—” Lance waits expectantly as Keith takes a deep breath. “I didn’t find this. Adam showed it to me.”

Lance seems to stare at him for a moment, and for a second Keith is terrified that Lance must’ve seen right through him—until his mouth curls up a little more and he huffs a laugh. “Sneaky,” he mutters, and then turns away to look back at the stars like they are beautiful.

Keith looks at Lance, because Lance is a boy with sunshine in his smile and stars in his eyes and he is a beautiful force of nature that puts those same stars to shame.

And Keith doesn’t know how to tell him that.

**Author's Note:**

> come say hi on [tumblr](https://www.taxashi.tumblr.com)!  
> 


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